The boys are back

Sam and Dean Winchester defeated Lucifer last season, but now that the “chapter” told in seasons one to five is done, the brothers will face a new set of challenges – some internal, some external.

As they grapple with their complicated relationship, they’ll also learn more about their mother’s side of the family when season six gets under way on SABC3 from November 7, 10.10pm. Season six producer Sera Gamble spoke about what fans could expect.

Where do things stand at the start of the season?

We wrapped up this five-year arc, so we have some resetting to do. And we did this one-year jump, so we have to catch up with the boys.

So, for a year, Dean thought Sam was locked in a cage in Hell?

Yeah, [he thought] that was it. There’s no way to get your brother out of the cage at the bottom of the lowest depths of the ninth circle of the worst bit of Hell.

Eric Kripke (series creator) at Comic-Con said there was still going to be conflict between the brothers.

There’s never not been conflict between the brothers. But what’s the nature of the conflict? Is it brother against brother or are they fractious while they fight a common enemy? It’s about the fact that they have grown and changed, and these characters, who when we met when they were young, have matured and changed a lot. It’s about them figuring out how they can be together and work together.

Eric talked about how Sam and Dean have begun to really accept each other. Is there more work to be done there?

There’s a different set of circumstances for each of them. We consciously skipped ahead because they had been nose to nose for a long time. We needed some distance between them, to get some personal history for each – some new stuff, new things to play for each of them.

You have some new and returning characters, right?

Mitch [Pileggi returning] is the big news. We love him. Corin Nemec is a hunter [from the Campbell side of the family]; he’s a recurring character. The Campbells [Mary Winchester’s family] have been hunters for a long time. Some are comparatively well-adjusted – they didn't become hunters because they watched their sister get her face ripped off when they were 10.

And there's a female Campbell ?

Played by a Canadian Jessica Heafey, she’s been fantastic so far. Crowley [Mark Sheppard] is back. Misha [Collins] is a series regular.

Castiel is a full-powered angel and Heaven is in bad shape. Misha had this dry way of describing it [as Yeltsin in the post-Soviet Union era], but I think it’s more like early days Obama, trying to rally people towards a new way of thinking.

What’s interesting about this new part of the journey?

There are a lot of different kinds of heroes’ journeys. We talked a lot about Joseph Campbell for years, we talked about Steven Spielberg movies and The Lord of the Rings.

We watch a lot of noir movies. It lends a different kind of gritty darkness because the heroes in the stories are not pure white hats.

There are a lot of shades of grey that we play with, in terms of the kind of heroes we’re interested in.– Chicago Tribune